The university is firmly rooted in south London, where £65 million has been spent in recent expansion. A campus opened last year in the centre of Croydon, focusing on business and healthcare, including a chiropractic clinic serving London’s only undergraduate master’s degree in the subject. The London Road building at the main campus in Southwark has been refurbished to add a library as well as computer rooms, catering facilities and a gym and sports centre.

Health students are based in hospitals in Romford, Leytonstone and Havering in east London, making LSBU one of the largest providers of healthcare professionals in the country. The university’s Institute of Health and Social Care underpins its mission to become the university of choice for the NHS and the healthcare workforce in London. The LSBU Health Skills Centre opened in 2021 in partnership with Guy’s and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust in a bid to encourage more local people into health and social care jobs.

The School of Health and Social Care was the institution's star performer in the latest Research Excellence Framework (REF 2021. Overall, however, LSBU has dropped 28 places in our research ranking to 92nd place, outpaced by the improvement of its peer institutions. 

LSBU regards itself primarily as a university of technology, although the modern curriculum is much wider than that. Three sociology degrees, specialising in sustainability, black studies and social policy, are taking their first students in 2022-23. Courses in history and human geography closed in 2021 because of poor recruitment. 

Student satisfaction improved in the latest National Student Survey, published in summer 2022, after a big drop in 2021 reflecting the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on undergraduate experience. Satisfaction with teaching quality has returned to the top 100 (97=). 

However, in our main academic league table, LSBU gained just one place overall and remains in the bottom ten.

Emerging from the pandemic, LSBU has returned to face-to-face tuition for undergraduates, retaining some elements of online provision. Consultation with students showed support for the majority of teaching to be delivered in person but enthusiasm for the flexibility of online features in a blended system. The university’s 2025 corporate strategy promises to reduce the volume of exam assessment but to hold those that continue to be required on campus.

A growing cohort of apprenticeships now involves a thousand employers, with earn-as-you-learn programmes operating from level 4 (the equivalent of a foundation degree) to level 7, equivalent to a master’s degree. There are expected to be 3,500 students enrolled on more than 30 programmes by 2023, with 2,500 taking degree apprenticeships. A tranche of healthcare programmes has been introduced for 2022-23 with others in management, engineering and surveying planned for 2023-24.

The university operates its own employment agency to help students to find part-time work while they study and provides strong support for start-up companies. However, although LSBU was our University of the Year for Graduate Employment in 2018 and 2019, it has slipped out of the top 100 (110th) in our analysis of the latest Graduate Outcomes survey, tracking the proportion of graduates in highly skilled work or further study within 15 months. 

Newly improved sports facilities include a multipurpose hall, therapy services and a fitness suite, dance studio and injury clinic.

There are 1,338 rooms in halls of residence, allowing 80 per cent of students to live in if they want to do so. International students are guaranteed a place and UK students who are far from home have priority.